BBC Africa: Eye to eye with the unknown

Africa will take you eye to eye with the unknown in the World’s greatest wilderness. The five diverse regions of this continent seem to stretch beyond the imagination.

BBC Africa will be featuring the following: Kalahari, Savannah, Congo, Cape and Sahara.

Synopsis

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The six-part series will use the latest in filming technology to explore previously unseen landscapes – from Angola to Mozambique and Libya to Sudan.

Africa's wilderness is facing massive and irrevocable change and, for many places, the series could be the last chance to experience the planet's greatest animals within their natural habitats.

From the Atlas Mountains in the north, to the Cape of Good Hope in the south, from the roof of Ethiopia in the east, to where the forest meets the sea in the west, the series aims to encompass the wildest places left on Earth.

BBC executive producer Mike Gunton says: "The series combines the epic power of Africa's landscapes with intimate and dramatic moments in the lives of individual creatures that struggle to survive there. Each episode focuses on a different region, unearthing the elements that have given each place its own unique character.

"With this series we have the chance to bring about a step-change in the way we use new photographic technology to enhance the intensity of the audience's experience and offer new perspectives on this amazing continent.

"That means there's everything from previously unseen landscapes filmed from the air; 700 day time-lapses; joining vultures as they soar over equatorial glaciers; following camels to an oasis hidden inside an extinct volcano; or capturing the microscopic detail of the strange behaviour of sand grains."

Kim Shillinglaw, Commissioning Editor for Science and Natural History, who will oversee the series, says: "Africa is going to look different and is going to be special. The BBC's Natural History Unit is thriving by innovating, creating the very best wildlife filming which viewers love and remember for years to come.

From the soaring Atlas Mountains to the Cape of Good Hope, the brooding jungles of the Congo to the raging Atlantic Ocean, filmed over four years, Africa explores the whole continent, uncovering an astonishing array of previously unknown places, bizarre new creatures and extraordinary behaviours.

Using the latest in filming technology, including remote HD cameras, BBC One takes an animals’ eye view of the action. The journey begins in the Kalahari, Africa’s ancient southwest corner, where two extraordinary deserts sit side by side and even the most familiar of its creatures have developed ingenious survival techniques.

Clever meerkats are outsmarted by a wily bird’s use of mimicry; remote infrared cameras catch the familiarly solitary rhino exhibiting previously unseen sociable behaviour; terrifying giant insects prey on baby birds; while in a previously unexplored cave, the rarest fish in the world is filmed for the first time.

The neighbouring Namib desert receives almost no rain but instead makes do with a vaporous vanishing fog. The harshness of life here means there is acute competition for scant resources, even between the seemingly gentler residents. In an astonishing television first, the Africa team capture a ferocious fight for supremacy between desert giraffes.

Eye to Eye goes behind the scenes at a secret location to witness probably the last great rhino gathering on Earth. Using specially build HD starlight-sensitive cameras, the crew captures never-seen-before rhino behaviour. It also reveals how the remarkable footage of the battling giraffes was achieved.

There are fewer things greater in television than a David Attenborough wildlife series. I'll be watching for sure, I'm sure there will be many stunning moments.

Spot on. Many have tried to emulate David Attenborough but no one can match him. Every time a new Attenborough doc comes on I think to myself I have got my license money's worth

One of these days I'll invest in a David Attenborough box set but he's done so many I don't know where to start.

I don't usually watch the Natural World series that's occasionally on BBC2 , and which often uses rehashed footage from other big budget natural history shows, but whenever DA does the commentary on them I'll make a special point of watching.